NDTScan carries out RAAC surveys in New Milton for schools, hospitals, councils, housing providers, universities and commercial owners. Reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete was used in roofs, floors and walls from the late 1950s to the mid 1990s, and a great deal of it is still in service across Hampshire. NDTScan is the UK's specialist in identifying it, assessing it and telling an owner plainly what to do next.
The Department for Education's list of education settings with confirmed RAAC, published in February 2024, includes 5 settings in Hampshire, among them Havant Academy, St Anne's Catholic Primary School and Farnborough College of Technology. The Department of Health and Social Care's list of hospital sites with confirmed RAAC includes Royal Hampshire County Hospital, Winchester and Southampton General Hospital in Hampshire. NDTScan cites the published lists as evidence that RAAC is in the Hampshire building stock, and for no other reason. Education and health estates were counted because government asked for them to be counted. The equivalent stock in New Milton's council, housing, leisure, retail and commercial buildings has not been, and that is where most uninspected RAAC now sits.
NDTScan surveys RAAC in New Milton in two stages that are usually completed on the same visit. First, identification: GPR and the plank's own signature, its width, its transverse reinforcement and its bearing detail, establish plank by plank whether the element is RAAC at all. Second, condition: each confirmed plank is inspected for cracking, deflection, bearing length, water ingress, corrosion and past repair, and the results are classified in line with IStructE guidance. The report says what was found, what was not found and how confident each reading is.
One rule applies to every RAAC survey in New Milton. No remediation, propping, strengthening or replacement should be designed until each plank has been identified and its condition recorded. Some of the most expensive RAAC decisions in the UK were taken on roofs that had never been properly surveyed. The survey is the cheapest part of getting the decision right, and NDTScan will say so to every New Milton client.
Scan before you repair. That is the standing advice for every New Milton client, and the reason NDTScan reports what the concrete contains before anyone specifies what to do about it.
Services Available in New Milton
- RAAC Identification Survey GPR based, plank by plank identification of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete in roofs, floors and walls across New Milton. Confirms what the element is made of without opening it up, and records plank widths, reinforcement and bearing details as evidence.
- RAAC Condition Assessment Plank level inspection of confirmed RAAC for cracking, deflection, bearing length, water ingress, corrosion and previous repairs, classified in line with IStructE guidance. Reported so a Hampshire engineer or estates team can act on it directly.
- RAAC Management and Reinspection Monitoring regimes, reinspection intervals and management plans for RAAC that is being kept in service, plus expert input where a New Milton owner needs an independent second opinion on a survey or a remediation proposal.
RAAC in and around New Milton
Typical New Milton instructions: RAAC identification in schools, halls, clinics and council buildings built between 1955 and 1995; plank by plank condition assessment of confirmed RAAC roofs and floors; risk classification in line with IStructE guidance to support decisions on closure, propping or continued use; reinspection and monitoring of managed RAAC; and independent review of surveys and remediation proposals for Hampshire owners and their insurers. NDTScan covers New Milton from Oxford in the same way it covers the rest of England.
NDTScan also provides RAAC surveys in Southampton, Portsmouth, Basingstoke, Gosport, Farnborough and Winchester and the rest of Hampshire. The rest of the region is covered from the South East RAAC surveys page, and the service itself is described on the RAAC surveys page.
About NDTScan
NDTScan is a specialist non-destructive testing company based in Oxford and led by Neil Smuts, author of The RAAC Book. It is the UK's specialist in the identification and analysis of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete, and a Level 4 UKCSS Operator, the first in the UK to achieve that certification. RAAC surveys in New Milton sit alongside the company's concrete scanning and structural condition survey work, and every report is written to a standard suitable for engineering acceptance, insurers and dispute work.